Austria: Correct recording of working hours – a factor for success

brief

The labor law stipulates that the deadline is September 2024.

content

1. Correct recording of working time is a factor in the success of employers
2. What factors should be considered when recording working time?
3. What are the benefits of recording working time correctly?
4. How can companies ensure correct records of working hours?

By ensuring that working hours are correctly recorded, employers can avoid significant penalties. Employees can better avoid overwork and the negative (health) consequences that can result from it. Correct recording of working hours also helps to improve workplace efficiency and enhances mutual trust between employees and employers. The employer’s obligations and the benefits that can result from full compliance with the law are outlined below.

Employers are obliged to record the exact start and end times of daily working hours, as well as daily rest periods. Exemptions are only possible in very special individual cases.

The obligation to record working time can be transferred to the employee by agreement between the employee and the employer. However, the employer still has the responsibility to instruct the employee to record working time correctly, to review the records and to keep the records for future reference. The employer is also responsible for incomplete, missing or incorrect records.

The law does not specify how working hours should be recorded. In practice, working hours are recorded using electronic timekeeping systems or Excel spreadsheets.

• Employee satisfaction and employee well-being

Correct recording of working hours leads to higher levels of employee satisfaction and health. Correct recording of working hours helps to detect potential overwork of individual employees at an early stage. This enables the employer to take early action (e.g. assess scope of responsibility, evaluate work processes, assess employee efficiency, etc.) to prevent employee overwork and absences due to health reasons. This ensures sustainable staffing.

• Compensating employees correctly

Accurately recording hours worked is the only way to ensure that employees are paid fairly and correctly. This is because the amount of certain surcharges depends on the time it takes to complete the work. Ensuring that employees are paid correctly and fairly will also help to avoid penalties (see below).

• Efficiency and productivity

If each employee’s workload is accurately recorded, it can be compared with that of other employees, allowing employers to check the efficiency and productivity of each employee and avoid unequal treatment.

If employers trust their employees to record their hours correctly, they can be more flexible with those employees’ hours, for example by agreeing to flexible working hours or allowing them to work from home.

However, if an employee records their working hours incorrectly (e.g. recording working hours that started earlier or ended later), this can undermine employee confidence and lead to legal consequences, including dismissal for just cause. The same is true if the actual working hours are not even extended, but the actual location of the working hours is simply not recorded correctly (e.g. recording working hours in the morning when working from home and the actual working hours in the evening). The mere recording of incorrect working time location is enough to seriously undermine the employer’s trust in the employee. This applies in particular to employees who work from home, as they enjoy a special trust from the employer.

Employers can avoid financial consequences by complying with legal requirements for recording work time. These include:

In the event of a violation of the obligation to record working hours, an administrative penalty of between €20 and €436 may be imposed for incorrect recording. For a complete lack of working time recording, an administrative penalty of between €72 and €1,815 may be imposed, or in the case of repeated violations, an administrative penalty of between €145 and €1,815 may be imposed. Further administrative penalties may be imposed in the event of a violation of other key protection provisions regarding working time (such as compliance with the 30-minute daily rest period and compliance with daily and weekly maximum working hours and minimum rest periods). Penalties may be cumulative as they are imposed for each violation and for each employee. This can result in severe penalties.

If, due to insufficient or missing records of working hours, the obligation to pay remuneration in full is also violated (so-called underpayment), an administrative fine of between €20,000 and €400,000 may be imposed.

To ensure that your company records working time correctly, your time recording system should include the following elements:

• Policy regarding recording of hours worked.
• Pay correctly for time recorded.
• Assign responsibilities internally and physically monitor compliance with working time (recording) regulations.
• Regularly analyse working time records for any deficiencies.
• Conduct regular training on working hours (recording) regulations.
• Respond to repeated or serious violations with labor law measures (e.g. warnings, dismissal for just cause, etc.).

If you have any questions about time recording, please let us know.

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